


the new boy

by kaixo (ballpoint)



Category: Football RPF
Genre: FIFA World Cup, FIFA World Cup 2018, Gen, england nt - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 05:30:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15136181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballpoint/pseuds/kaixo
Summary: Ruben Loftus-Cheek’s first time with the senior team. At times, it feels like a hazing.  A character study.





	the new boy

“Yo, Ruben. You’re with me,” Eric said. 

Ruben swallowed the last of his omelette. Narrowed his eyes at Eric, as they all were seated around the tables for breakfast. The day after the rest day after _that night_ , and they’d come down from the high of winning their first match in the World Cup. 

After a day of rest and recovery, it was time to play tourist. 

Ruben still buzzing, even though he’d only tasted nine minutes of action two days before. , _Still_ unable to dim his grins like someone touched in the head over the whole thing. 

A week in, and life at their hotel already slumbering into a routine. Only seven am, but the day felt as if it were much later, due to light hitting this side of the world from three a.m. 

In the relatively modest dining room, the tables quiet, players and staff scattered around the tables, talking amongst themselves in low tones. One of those times where it felt as if you either arrived too late or too early for breakfast. 

Ruben looked at his watch, comforted to note that it was still early. 

Looked at his teammate. 

Eric, his hair still spiky and tow headed from a fresh buzz cut. His eyes in a pronounced squint as if he’d had stayed up all night. Or gotten up too early because he forgot to close his blackout curtains. Sharing a room with Dele could do that to a person. 

“Oh yeah? Where are we going?”

“The Hermitage, I think?” Eric’s eyes thoughtful, as he absently rubbed at the nape of his neck. “I’m not so sure. But, it’s Saint Petersburg. You can’t come all the way out here and not have a look see.”

Ruben didn’t mind. Although his first senior campaign with the lads, he was an old hand at this international team tournament tours. Ruben knew how to go along to get along. He’d do naked golf swings in the Gulf of Finland if he had to. 

“Not coming with us then, Dele?” he asked, looking across the table to his teammate. Dele shot him a look, pointed to some vague area below the surface of the table. 

“Nah, fam,” Ruben laughed, “rude. I’ll pass.”

Dele frowned. 

Blinked. 

Rolled his eyes and did that little tut and frown he was prone to do when annoyed. “Thigh strain!” he exclaimed with a bit of huff. “Take your mind out of the gutter.”

“But it’s comfortable there,” Ruben laughed, reaching for his orange juice. 

“Wasteman,” Dele mumbled, but there was no heat behind the insult, so Ruben ignored it. “Anyway, I’m parked here for the minute,” he rested his chin in his palm, his elbow on the table. 

“No Fortnite,” Eric wagged his finger in Dele’s direction. 

“Yes, Mum,” Dele rolled his eyes, but his smile gave his true intentions away. When it came to Eric and Dele... they had less banter and more _needle_ , if that made sense. 

“You could do something different, like... read a book,” Eric waved his _Lonely Planet Guide_ in Dele’s direction. Dele held up his hands, forefingers in a cross as if warding off evil. 

Eric rolled his eyes then. “Suit yourself, Dele.”

“I always do.”

Eric nodded, the look he shot Dele unreadable. “That you do,” he said.

***

_The Hermitage museum is the second largest in the world. Hermitage comes from the word ‘hermit’. The building was initially given this name because of its exclusivity ; in its early days, only very few people were allowed to visit..._

Ruben looked up and around him, the soothing notes of the narrator in his earpiece. 

They were in the Winter Palace.

The rooms drowned in the strong summer sunshine that made itself known, even through semi transparent drapes were drawn to dim the daylight. The first word that came to mind was bling. Followed closely by gold. 

Especially that old eighties song one of his youth coaches loved to sing, _Gold!_

Gold columns, as big as five of his teammates stood together shoulder to shoulder. 

Gold trim around the windows, golden chandeliers throwing off light which illuminated the golden patterns and grooves in the ceiling like the Aladdin’s cave you read about in stories. 

Gold. Not rose gold, not silver-gold or white gold. 

Sun yellow- gold. 

Not just a descriptor or colour, but a state of being. 

_Imperial_. 

Ruben’s brain snagged on the word in the flow information given by the narrator in his ear, and he held on to it. Nodded to himself. It made sense. The dazzle of gold on gold overwhelming in the sheer breadth of it. His mind unable to even calculate the _scope_ of it. Like... how even?

“Nice, eh?” Eric’s voice tugged at him into the present, and Ruben looked over, seeing Eric’s eyes fixed on the grooves in the ceiling, which seemed to _bleed and flow_ gold, due to the bright, unflickering light of the chandeliers. This place was overwhelming. You had to focus on one wonder at a time, or else your brain just shorted out processing too much. Supposedly, this was an art museum, but he just couldn’t get past the building itself. 

Too rich, too... _much_. 

Your eyes not being able to rest on the pictures on the walls, because his eyes kept being drawing to the details of the room itself. The ceilings alone, painted scenes of angels and skies - colourful and intricate like sprawls of tapestry. 

“Yeah,” Ruben agreed. “I’m -- wow.”

Even with the press of people milling around them, the grand rooms seemed to absorb their presence, their noise, their bodies without much trouble. People tripped into the rooms with loud voices, only to fall quiet at the awesome spectacle of wealth around them. 

“Good,” Eric chirped, “we have a few more rooms to do.”

***

Somehow, Ruben found himself palling with the midfielder’s union: namely Jordan, Delph and Eric. Eric counted as a midfielder in this team, although he really played centre back for his club team. Gary a bit of a tag a long, but as a fellow Chelsea player, it was nice to have him to turn to.

Although, to tell the truth, it wasn’t as if he needed to turn to Cahill. 

Most of the younger lads like Dele, Eric and Stones he’d already known from their U21 and U19 campaigns for England. 

“So,” and this was Hendo, as friendly and open as the days were long here. “Do you think--?” he started. 

Ruben stared at the paintings in front of him. Seated on a velvet couch, with Hendo to his left and Eric to his right. Lifted his head to pose for the pictures to be uploaded by the social media team. 

“Huh?”

“I mean,” Hendo said, “there is a chance.”

***

“Do you know,” Eric began, “the original name of Saint Petersburg was Sankt-Peterburg?”

Ruben shook his head, pushing his shades up on the bridge of his nose. They were outside the Hermitage, its expansive aquamarine and white exterior strangely plain, now that they had seen the frenzied luxuries on display inside. 

The din of the people that flowed around them now going from ninety nine to about fifty nine. 

Still a swarm of people that Ruben couldn’t get used to - and he was a London boy, for crying out loud. 

“Sankt-Peterburg? That sounds...”

“Dutch,” Eric agreed. “Supposedly Peter the Great liked everything Dutch. Which makes a change from say, a lot of Russian rulers liking everything French.”

“Like who?” Ruben asked, not really expecting an answer. 

“Catherine the Great,” Eric held up his _Lonely Planet_. 

“Oh,” Ruben said, because he didn’t know who she was. 

A silence fell between them as they stood in the stretch of the courtyard. 

They were waiting on the FA staff to round up the rest of the lads who came along with them to the Hermitage, and now looking to do a tour of the city itself. The air alive with children and teenagers laughing. Of adults talking amongst themselves, and posing for pictures and taking pictures outside of the museum. 

“You... really shouldn’t.” Eric said after a while. 

At Ruben’s confused look, Eric continued, “Worry about if you’re going to be named to the starting or not,” he said, his smile kind. “Just be ready, yeah. The gaffer wouldn’t call you up if you weren’t.”

“I’m not worried,” Ruben said, “haven’t even thought about it at all.”

“Good,” Eric whipped out his phone, and scanned the screen. “Keep not thinking about it.”

***

As if he couldn’t not think about it.

Ruben out on the field, restless. 

They’d come back in time for rest, light training, dinner, before they broke up for the night. 

Ruben taking the opportunity to slink off towards the small field before anyone had a chance to speak to him. 

The gaffer insisted on a small playing field away from training fields, for players to have a relaxed time of it, from and everything else that screamed COMPETITION and PREPARATIONS. It wasn’t as if you could get away from it; that’s the reason why he pushed himself to get here. The shiver of pleasure that he enjoyed when he thought about the last nine minutes of his _first_ game. 

Put it away, and looked forward to the next game. 

For now, he put his headphones on his ears, turned on some beats, while he played with the competition ball. His studs scraping across its surface; flicking it on to his instep, and did a half walk, half shuffle as he moved the tournament ball from foot to foot. The Adidas Telstar. Walking and kicking the ball around from foot to foot, taking in its balance and weight. His eye on the spin of it, of how it landed. Decided that he liked it.

It didn’t wobble or do crazy things when kicked, so you didn’t have to think about factoring in a bit more spin or strength when doing free kicks or set pieces. 

Ruben looked up, feeling not so much _lonely_ as much as alone. 

On this side of the world, their hotel in the near distance, semi hidden by spruce and fir trees. You stumbled on the field past the curved asphalt path leading from the hotel, blocked by wooden fences and shaded by trees, to this level bit of green. 

Seven p.m. and the day still felt young, and long. The sky overhead still so bright, the blue in the sky slightly faded. 

Ruben, just because he _felt_ like it, started doing keep ups. 

From instep, to knee. Chest and shoulder, careful to avoid a handball. 

Short of the green underfoot, and the space, he could have been a child again, just doing nothing but follow the ball. 

And --

“Psst, hey! Cheeky.”

Ruben looked up, eyes in a squint, vaguely annoyed to be drawn out of his thoughts. Blinked, only to raise his eyebrows at seeing Dele standing on the edge of the green. 

“Dele.”

“Yeah,” Dele said, “toss it here, bring me in.”

“Dele,” Ruben said with a last knee of the ball, only to catch it in his hands. “Mate, aren’t you supposed to be on bed rest?”

“I have a slight knock,” Dele answered, walking on to the grass in gear that definitely wasn’t training kit. Highly distressed jeans, a white t-shirt topped off with an embroidered bomber jacket. The most surprising thing wasn’t his dress sense - even though pink and orange on a jacket just didn’t go- but the fact that he stood there - alone. 

Odd, because Dele was more a packdog than a lone wolf. He always had someone in tow: be it Raheem or Harry or Eric. But with them on different training regimes to his- with his slight knock- that might have been the reason for him standing here. Without people. 

“I’m not dead,” Dele finished. 

“No,” Ruben agreed, but had to point out the obvious, “still a member of Injury FC though.”

“Outpatient,” Dele grinned, wagging his fingers. “It’s not even a niggle. Come on, be a love. Share.”

“If your strain gets worse--”

“Then you get a chance in the starting eleven. Win, win, innit?”

Ruben scooped the ball under his arm, tugged his headphones from his ears to hang around his neck. 

“That’s...” he started, shook his head. “That’s cold, Dele, and you know it.”

Dele had the grace to look abashed, rubbing at his bridge of his nose with both index and forefinger. 

“That’s the rumour.”

“You should be playing _Fortnite_ or hanging with Raheem or doing hydrotherapy or something.”

“Or something.”

Ruben sighed, narrowing his eyes at Dele. 

“I’m not going to have a kickabout with you and ruin your chances of the rest of the matches here. That’s daft. If the skipper ever found out--”

“Who, H?” Dele’s grin arch, the light in his eye edgy and bold. “He won’t know.”

“And the gaff?”

“I’ll take all the stick coming our way. Come on.” 

Ruben opened his mouth, ready to say no, only for Dele to ask, “Or don’t you want to know which one of us is better?”

“With a strained thigh?”

“We’ll be on level terms then.”

And those, as they said, were fighting words.

***

Dele was a slippery bastard.

The sort of footballer that was a _nightmare_ to play against; able to twist and torque his torso in ways so that his body language was unreadable. You didn’t know what he was thinking; his body giving no clue until thought turned to action, with him skipping away. 

The Spanish lads at Chelsea had a name for it - _ilusion_. 

Ball flicking from instep into an arc over their heads, Dele tripping out of the way to catch the ball with his heel. Not even a millisecond of thought, before he scampered away with the ball at his foot like a faithful dog. 

On top of that, Dele had the snide about him. 

Shimmering out of reach with a mocking laugh, and pointed insults. Jacket swirling around his torso like a colorful cape. 

“Too slow, old man,” he said between breaths, pulling off a neat stepover. 

Ruben-- wasn’t Dele. 

He didn’t have Dele’s almost contortionist ways, nor his showmanship. 

What Ruben had was his height and sheer size, coupled with nice, soft feet. A neat step over as he glided past Dele, nicking the ball from his feet, holding him at length with his arm out. 

“Buggery,” Dele hissed. 

“Mind the gap,” Ruben cracked, shielding the ball from Dele with his body, wincing at Dele’s elbow jabbing in his side. 

“You bell--!”

“ Ruben. _Dele_.”

Oh oh.

Ruben froze, his body shielding Dele’s, ball falling from mid air to his feet. 

Slowly, and with exaggerated care, he stepped to one side, Dele shuffling behind him, back heeling the ball to the far corner of the rough of green.

“Skip,” Ruben greeted cautiously. 

Although Harry was easy enough to get on with, and didn't have any airs around him, he could get annoyed about certain things. Forthright enough to let you know the source of the irritant with a quiet word. In the distance, he sighted Walks and Tripps in the mid distance coming down the path, talking animatedly. 

Wishing that they were here beside H now, so that this talk wasn’t going to happen. 

“Not you, Cheeky,” Harry motioned Ruben to one side.

“Don't -” Dele hissed, hand on Ruben’s side to hold him in place, but he wasn't in the crosshairs of Harry's I’m-ashamed-of-you-son hangdog look. 

The one that didn't scream anger as much as disappointment.

“Sorry, mate,” Ruben mumbled, stepping away, leaving Dele exposed to Harry’s stare. The level one that he was now cultivating to great effect, with raised eyebrows and his mouth in a sharp line. 

“Dele,” Harry sighed, “you know you're supposed to be resting,” he spoke slowly, each word another brick of guilt on the one before. Ruben just couldn’t _stand it_ and it wasn’t even directed at _him_. “Why would you have Ruben out here -?”

“I found him out here,” Dele tried for charm and a flash of a grin. His features fading rapidly into sobriety when Harry didn't respond. 

Not verbally, anyway, with the solemn look in his eyes, and the line of his mouth. 

“Fine,” Dele shrugged his shoulders with the air of a moody teen. “ I was bored. Cheeky was here, and ... It's my fault, not his.”

“Hey, I didn't have to say yes, mate,” Ruben said, not knowing why he sprung to Dele’s defence. Dele a lad who needed no protection, and he already had two seasons on the senior team, whereas Ruben was a newbie. 

“Dele should and does know better,” Harry stepped on to the green, walking over to Dele, who now had the ball in his hands. 

“Okay, _Mum_ ,” Dele rolled his eyes, moving away from Ruben, passing Harry and running off to meet with Walks and Tripps who greeted him with high fives and half hugs. 

“What’s that about, then?” Ruben asked, knowing that he had just missed something. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Harry said, patting Ruben’s shoulder, as they watched Dele spinning the football on the tip of his middle finger, speaking animatedly to Walks, flashing a grin at whatever he’d said. 

“But-”

“Seriously,” Harry patted his shoulder, his voice friendly. “Focus on the game for Thursday.”

***

Oh _that_ game, Thursday, where they lost to Belgium because Rashford couldn’t put the ball away.

Amongst other things. 

The air in the dressing room -- odd. Not one of disappointment, because they _had_ made it through the group stages. 

Just... odd. 

Because he hadn’t played much club football before this, he didn’t even have the high point of meeting teammates in opposing colours after the match. Not like Eric, Harry, Walks, Tripps and Dele did with half of the Belgian team before and after with hugs and grins. 

Ruben hadn’t even known Michy Batshuayi that well and they had been teammates - at least on paper- at Chelsea. 

Phone in hand, he’d sat in the ice bath. 

He hated ice baths, where you had to just sit for three to five minutes until the magic of it worked, guarding against inflammation and increasing blood flow. He _knew_ why they were needed, and after fifteen years playing the game, he _understood how_ they worked - but he still hated them. When you loathed doing something, one minute felt like thirty, and five minutes felt like half a day. 

Idly, he checked his Whatsapp messages, grinning at the texts from Nate Chalobah, a fellow Chelsea academy lad now at Watford, and showing off the new Watford kit in the photos _How you like it, fam?_

_Looking like a bee. LOL._

At Nate’s sad face emoji, Ruben laughed, typed in, _J/k, looking good. Got your grades yet?_

_Nah. Off to the beach now with the missus. Smash it, lad. IT’S COMING HOME_

***

Ruben snuggled down in the seat in the coach.

He’d lucked out, getting a row of seats to himself. Of course, a row of seats just meant two, one for yourself (the window seat) and the other seat free, where you could put your jacket to mark it off as territory. The coach leaving the stadium, on the way to the airport before flying back to their base. The time knocking on 12am but the sky had the twilight of late summer evenings he was beginning to recognise as a feature in this part of the world. Dark enough for lights to flicker on, but not for him to doze off. 

Overhead, the lights were on in the coach, but dimmed to about 50%. Enough light to rummage in your pouch for stuff, but too dim to read by. 

His headphones on, rocking out to _One Kiss_ by Calvin Harris and Dua Lipa playing on the local radio station. 

Tune. 

It never failed to get him rocking complete with hand movements and snapping of fingers. On the last repeat of the chorus Ruben swung his head around, opened his eyes. 

Words drying on his tongue as he discovered, he was not alone. 

“Dele,” he said. 

Dele raised his eyebrows, and even in the dim light of the coach you saw his default smirk. Ruben pulled his headphones from his head, reluctantly cutting off the song. 

“Tough luck tonight,” he said. Clad in the bright England short-sleeved training shirt in the colours of red, white and blue, grey track top tied around his waist. 

“We’re still in it,” Ruben tugged off his headphones, turning to look at Dele, trying to gauge his mood. It wasn’t as if they didn’t _know_ each other. They’d come up together from England U-15s to now members of the senior international team. 

If pushed, Ruben would actually say that they were friends, so why--?

“We still have a chance, going forward,” Dele agreed, shifting his weight on to his elbow, moving his face close enough for Ruben to smell the Haribos on his breath. Oh-oh, Dele had gotten into the sweets again. “Not that you need me to weigh in, but you did well. You _could_ shoot more. You get yourself into good positions and ---” he cut himself off with a wave of his hand. “That’s the gaffer’s job to point that out, and that’s not why I’m here.

_Hmm_

“Go on.”

“I’m sorry for being arsey,” Dele said. “I know that we’re in direct competition for places, but that’s no excuse. You wouldn’t have been tapped to be here if you weren’t good enough. I mean, you were better than all of us for a long time.”

“Yeah,” Ruben drawled out, seeing the street signs lit by neon and street lights, written in a language he couldn’t get his head around. “But, that was a long time ago.” Dele had gotten on the grind, in League one, which got him into Tottenham. Now, three seasons into Tottenham and over one hundred apps for the club, compared to himself being only being on loan for the past season... Ruben had a lot of ground to make up and fast. 

“A long time ago,” he repeated, “you’ve been doing well for yourself.”

“You’re alright, Ruben. You’ll only get better. I just... H didn’t tear a strip off you too badly, did he?”

“He was... you know Harry. He’s just... “ Ruben paused, because to describe Harry in a word was difficult. He was just... “H.” A thought occurred to him as he slid a look in Dele’s direction. “Did Harry - he talked to you, didn’t he?”

“Not the hairdryer treatment, if that’s what you’re asking,” Dele rolled his eyes. “But I don’t need to him to point out things. Not anymore, anyways. So...”

“Apology accepted. You can’t help being a bellend. Besides, the next time we do a one on one, you’ll be sorry soon enough.”

Dele huffed a half laugh. “Let me get fully mended, and we’ll do it for real next time. Anyway --”

“Anyway?”

“Since you’re Billy no mates down here, you want to join us near the front? Or, are you going to stay here and bop to your tunes, Mr Party of one?”

“ _One Kiss_ is a banger,” he admitted, and at Dele’s raised eyebrow and steady gaze, he cracked up, knowing that Dele wouldn’t take no for an answer. Looked up to see Rahem and Stonesy sticking their heads over their seats not too far away. 

“Dele, is Cheeky coming or what?” Stones hissed, “ this round of Uno won’t wait, you know.”

“Ah,” Ruben stroked his chin, chuckling to himself, “Ready to get tonked, Dele?”

“Big talk,” Dele grinned. “If you lose though, you’ll have to do thirty burpees.”

Burpees were the worst. He couldn’t handle more than twenty at most. But. Beating Dele at Uno was too tempting a prospect to pass up, and Stones and Raheem were good company. “I won’t lose,” he said.

Fin

**Author's Note:**

> [ Englad's hotel ](https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/44455055)   
>  [ Hermitage Museum. I can't do it justice. It's beautiful](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermitage_Museum)
> 
>  
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> 
> Missed football RPF week by a mile. For prompt on day 7: your team at the world cup.


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